TRANSFORMING CARE CONFERENCE

OCTOBER 18-19, 2018 | COLUMBUS, OHIO

2018 TRANSFORMING CARE

LGBTQ & HIV/AIDS Health Equity Conference

The Equitas Health Institute for LGBTQ Health Equity is hosting the 2018 Transforming Care: LGBTQ & HIV/AIDS Health Equity Conference on October 18-19 at The Ohio State University Fawcett Center. Activists, academics, community members, and health & social service professionals are encouraged to attend this two-day conference that addresses health disparities affecting the LGBTQ and HIV/AIDS community.

The conference will provide a unique opportunity for professionals and community members to come together to share not only research and best practices but practical information like family planning, wellness activities, and health and safety initiatives.

2018 Confirmed Conference Speakers

Sarah McBride

2018 Plenary Speaker

Sarah McBride is the National Press Secretary for the Human Rights Campaign and author of Tomorrow Will Be Different: Love, Loss, and the Fight for Trans Equality.

In 2012, Sarah made national headlines when she came out as transgender while serving as student body president at American University. A native of Wilmington, Delaware, Sarah serves on the Board of Directors of Equality Delaware, the state’s primary LGBTQ-advocacy organization. In that capacity, Sarah helped lead the successful effort to add gender identity and expression to her state’s nondiscrimination and hate-crimes laws. In 2008, Sarah worked for Governor Jack Markell (D-DE) and, in 2010, for former Attorney General Beau Biden (D-DE). Prior to coming to HRC, Sarah worked on LGBTQ equality at the Center for American Progress and interned at the White House, the first out trans woman to do so.

Sarah became the first openly transgender person to address a major party political convention when she spoke at the 2016 Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia.

Scott A. Schoettes

2018 Plenary Speaker

Scott A. Schoettes, who lives openly with HIV, is Counsel and the HIV Project Director at Lambda Legal, the oldest and largest national legal organization dedicated to making the case for equality on behalf of lesbians, gay men, bisexuals, transgender people and people living with HIV, through impact litigation, education and policy work.

Schoettes litigates impact cases involving discriminatory denial of employment and services based on a person’s HIV status, as well as in the areas of HIV criminalization, access to care and privacy. He does a significant amount of amicus work on issues of import to people living with HIV, notably twice co-authoring amicus briefs in the U.S. Supreme Court’s review of the Affordable Care Act.

On the policy side, Schoettes was the point-person for Lambda Legal’s work on the repeal of the HIV travel ban, is committed to ending the blanket ban on blood donation by gay and bisexual men, and has served as a legal advisor in two successful campaigns to reform laws criminalizing conduct based on HIV status.

In September 2014, he was appointed by President Barack Obama to serve on the Presidential Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS (PACHA). On that body, Schoettes co-chaired the Disparities Committee, which focused on HIV-related health inequities for women, including transgender women, gay and bisexual men of color, young people, people living with HIV in the South and others.

In June 2016, he led a group resignation from PACHA. The op-ed he authored criticizing the Trump Administration for its apathy and inaction with respect to the on-going HIV/AIDS epidemic in the U.S. set off a media firestorm that has forced the Administration to start paying greater attention to the issue.

Ken Williams

2018 Plenary Speaker

Ken Williams is a speaker, storyteller, HIV activist, media presence, and the creative force behind the award winning, queer-conscious, video blog, Ken Like Barbie. Diagnosed with HIV in 2010, Ken has contributed much of his online presence to issues affecting PLHIV, with a special attention to communities of color.

Ken has collaborated on a national level creating video content and cultivating relationships with prominent media and AIDS Service Organizations such as the Black AIDS Institute, the CDC, and AIDS.gov where he contributes on a quarterly basis as a guest blogger for their Black Voices project. Ken’s work, both visual and written, tackles universal issues & themes through the lens of gay, black metaphors. He is proudly both. Ken’s storytelling approach has not only been celebrated by the LGBT community but his video work and messaging is honored globally.

Miriam Yeung

2018 Plenary Speaker

Raised in the projects of Brooklyn, Miriam Yeung is proud, queer, immigrant, woman, activist parent. From 2008 – 2016, she led the National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum (NAPAWF), the nation’s only national multi-issue organization dedicated to building power and winning reproductive justice, economic justice and immigrant rights for Asian American and Pacific Islander women and girls. During her time at NAPAWF, Miriam became an expert on so-called Prenatal Nondiscrimination laws – racist and sexist anti-abortion laws which target Black and Asian women, and testified in Congress against these measures twice. She also co-founded We Belong Together, a campaign that organizes women for immigrant rights. Prior to that Miriam spent 10 years at NYC LGBT Community Center doing youth organizing, policy and government relations work where she built the Causes in Common coalition, a crossmovement initiative to more closely align the LGBT liberation movement with the reproductive rights, health and justice movements; developed the NYS and NYC Dignity for All Students laws; and successfully advocated for the inclusion of LGB youth in statewide data collection efforts. Miriam received the Ms. Foundation’s Gloria Steinem Woman of Vision award in 2016. Miriam has a MPA from Baruch College and a BA from NYU.